“How do I seek permission to leave the apartments, then?” asked the Aquamancer, changing the subject.
“Call me, and I’ll arrange for an escort, if you need one. The palace at Balistan and its grounds are vast and beautiful, and there’s much to see and do. Not to mention the city beyond the walls—the bazaars, the cafes, the theaters, the lake for fishing and boating, and secluded beaches for bathing. Adventurous souls ride out on the dunes to picnic or visit wandering Sheiks ... but I don’t recommend that without a trusted guide, at least until you’re more familiar with the ways of the desert. In fall and winter there’re often quite terrible sandstorms which can be very dangerous.”
“A sea of sand doesn’t particularly worry me,” decided Myrn as the Seraglio Mistress started again toward the front door. “Maybe I’ll try swimming in the lake. Is it safe?”
“Safe as kittens,” the woman assured her. “Thank you, dear Mistress Brightglade. Pull on the red cord whenever you wish me to come. I’ll be here at once, unless I’m called first to attend on the Sultana.”
“Tell me one other thing,” said Myrn as they neared the door to the apartment. “What sort of person is Sultana Nioba? When do you think I could greet her?”
“There’s no kinder, gentler, more affectionate, more sweet-tempered lady in the whole of Samarca! If you like, I’ll tell her that you wish to meet her privately. She’s sure to agree, for she is ... well, although I shouldn’t say it... lonely, despite her friends here and her husband the Sultan just at the other end of the palace.”
“Do that, Aeasha,” murmured Myrn. “I should pay my respects to her, at any rate. She sounds like a very nice person.”
“Oh, she is that,” Aeasha assured her from the doorway. “Good afternoon, Lady Myrn! Now, strike the blue gong and your own servants will come to you. As for me, ring the red bell when I can help you further.”
And she whisked out and down the hall, as if she feared she had said much too much already.
Myrn amused herself by exploring the large, airy apartment in depth, not just looking at the luxurious furniture and fine furnishings, but probing for secrets using certain Wizardly skills she’d learned from Augurian, long ago.
She soon discovered a hidden passageway within the thick wall between her bedroom and the sitting room, complete with hidden peepholes through which to watch and hear anyone in either room. A spy could reach this secret passage from a linen closet in the hall outside, and presumably reach other passages overlooking the several adjacent empty apartments as well.
“Inches deep in drifted sand and dust,” she muttered to herself. “And the hinges haven’t been oiled in years! Nobody’s used these secret ways to spy on the Sultan’s hareem in a long, long time. Good!”
Just to be sure, she installed some simple Confusion Spells. When she was finished, no intruder could use the secret passages without her knowing of it, and once he got inside, the spy holes would be very difficult to use due to an excess of spiderwebs in the proper places.
Myrn opened a wide, latticed door and went onto the private terrace. She was gazing out over the lake and wishing Douglas were with her when there came a discreet knock on the apartment’s front door.
She started to utter a charm for door-opening, but stopped herself in time.
No use giving myself away just yet, she mused.
She walked to the door and peeped through its own hidden spy hole. Lady Aeasha waited patiently on her doorstep, hands demurely folded.
“Her Majesty the Sultana would be pleased if you could come see her, now,” she called to Myrn through the panels. “There’ll be very little time later.”
“Well, if she doesn’t mind a little dust and sweat...,” Myrn said, laughing as she opened the door for Aeasha. “I haven’t had a bath yet.”
“Of course, you should bathe...,” began the Seraglio Mistress. “But if you don’t come soon, who knows when ‘later’ will be. Tomorrow, perhaps?”
“I’ll come now, then, dirt, dust, sweat, and all,” decided Myrn. “Let me run a comb through my hair and splash my face with cool water.”
In less than five minutes Myrn had followed the Seraglio Mistress around the center court to the southern wing of the seraglio.
“This wing is mostly empty, of course,” Lady Aeasha told her, speaking softly. “In the old days ...”
“Grandfather had a number of wives, I gather,” said Myrn matter-of-factly. “How’d he manage it, I wonder, Aeasha. Personally, I can’t think of anything more boring than a whole wing filled with women with little to do but get into mischief.”
“I wasn’t here then, of course,” said the Seraglio Mistress. “I have heard such tales, m’lady! Makes you think maybe the young Sultan is wisest after all, holding his wives to one nice lady like our Sultana!”
She paused at a door at the end of the hallway and knocked twice, softly.
In a moment the door swung wide and they were admitted by a girl in a rather brief costume consisting of a pair of trousers of clinging, transparent material and a bodice of the same flimsy cloth wrapped loosely about her breasts several times and tied behind her neck.
“Her Majesty awaits you, ladies!” The maid bobbed and smiled. “This way, please.”
Myrn and Aeasha followed her through a large, ornately decorated reception room, down a short, mirrored hall, and out onto an open balcony shaded from the afternoon sun with green-and-white striped awnings—the royal colors, Myrn guessed, for they had appeared on all the flags flying at the royal dock when the Seacaptain’s party had landed.
Seated on a low couch against the curving balcony baluster was a beautiful and somewhat wistful-looking young woman with light brown skin and the largest, clearest, most appealing brown eyes Myrn had ever seen.
“Her Highness the Sultana Nioba, First and Forever Wife of our Gracious and Gifted Sultan Trobuk,” Lady Aeasha announced, dropping a deep courtesy. “Your Majesty, may I present Lady Myrn Manstar Brightglade of Waterand and Flowring Islands in western Great Sea?”
The Sultana nodded her head pleasantly to Myrn’s own, respectful bow.
“Welcome to our palace and our country, Lady Myrn.”
“Very pleased to meet Your Majesty,” replied the Aquamancer, bowing again gravely. “Forgive me if I don’t know quite the protocol for meeting a Sultana. You’re the very first I’ve ever seen.”
Sultana Nioba laughed. Her smile lit up her heart-shaped face like a beacon from within.
“No formalities are needed, Lady Myrn. I’m so pleased you wished to meet me privately. Official functions never do much for getting acquainted with one’s guests, I find. Please have a seat and let us become friends.”
She patted the cushions beside her. Myrn seated herself at once.
“Leave us, if you wish, Aeasha,” said the Sultana. “I know you have much to do, even in this empty hareem’’
The Seraglio Mistress bowed twice, smiled encouragingly at Myrn, and left the two young ladies alone on the balcony.
“Or will she listen from inside the walls, Majesty?” Myrn wondered aloud.
“Not Aeasha!” The Sultana laughed aloud. “I don’t think it has ever occurred to Aeasha to spy on me—or on anyone else, for that matter. I’m very fond of Aeasha. I sometimes wish she were a bit more ... well, assertive!”
“I know what you mean, Your Highness.” chuckled Myrn.
“Tell me of yourself—your origins, your education, your travels,” Nioba begged, leaning forward eagerly. “I would love to travel, but there has been little opportunity so far. Where is your Isle of Flowring? Is that right? Flowring? A strange name.”
“Don’t they teach even future Sultanas practical stuff like geography?” Myrn asked. “No? Well, let me give you your first lesson.”
She drew a piece of chalk from her wide left sleeve and began to draw the outlines of Sea on the blue-tiled floor at their feet, showing, one by one, the locations of Old Kingdom, Dukedom, Highlandorm, the Empire of Choin, and, acro
ss the lower edge, the vast desert Serecomba.
“This is now called New Land,” Myrn said, drawing in the long course of New River. “A few years ago it ceased to be Eternal Ice Glacier when the ice began to melt.”
“A river of ice!” exclaimed Nioba. “It’s hard to imagine.”
“Very cold and rather uncomfortable, if you don’t dress warmly,” Myrn added. “But true! Actually, I was prisoner there for several days, four years ago. It took my best efforts to keep from turning quite blue.”
The Sultana begged eagerly for the story and when her women came to bathe and dress her for dinner, the two girls were chattering and laughing like old school friends.
“You must tell me more of your wonderful Wizard husband and beautiful children and the dear old Wizards!” cried the Sultana, rising reluctantly. “Later. I’ll have you seated next to me at dinner. Your stories are better than my grandmother’s fantasies of djinni and wicked sorcerers!”
“My pleasure, Your Majesty,” said Myrn rather formally now that the servants were within earshot. “My very great pleasure!”
No one came to show Myrn back to her apartment but she had a Wizard’s bravery and a Seaman’s sense of direction, so found her way without a faltering step. She pulled the blue cord which called her chambermaids, stripped off her dusty traveling clothes, and slid gratefully into a hot, perfumed bath.
She noted a new costume laid out for her on the bed.
“I see they didn’t give me anything in green.” She laughed aloud, working up a mound of fragrant lather with the vial of scented soap she found in a silver tray beside the pool. “Green must be the royal color here. No matter! Blue’s my best color anyway.”
Aeasha came to escort Myrn to the Sultan’s private dinner party, giving her an approving glance and a timid smile.
“We’ll walk slowly, as we’re a bit early,” she told the Aquamancer, holding the door wide. “What a becoming necklace of strange white stones! What are they, please?”
“Pearls,” Myrn explained. “Haven’t you ever seen pearls before?”
“Never!” cried the Seraglio Mistress. “Pearls? They must come from very far away.”
“Never seen pearls before?” wondered the Aquamancer aloud. “They aren’t earth gems, like your own rubies and amethysts. They’re water jewels, grown by Sea creatures called oysters.”
“ ‘Oysters’?”
Myrn used their leisurely stroll from the seraglio through the main palace to the Sultan’s private wing to explain the origins and uses of pearls.
“I never heard of such a wondrous thing,” exclaimed the Seraglio Mistress. “And I’ve had to become an expert on rare jewels and precious metals in my position.”
She left Myrn in the charge of a tall, silent Guardsman at the entrance to the Sultan’s private apartment.
“I’ll come or send someone to escort you back to your apartment when the dinner ends,” she told Myrn.
“You aren’t invited to dinner?” Myrn asked in surprise.
“No. I’ve my duties to attend to, of course. With you and the Sultana here, and Lady Gerhana also, my hareem is empty except for servants. I’ll have a pleasant meal with my chief assistants, and we’ll conduct business and perhaps play draughts later in my own little apartment on the desert side. Have a splendid evening, Mistress!”
And she disappeared as quickly as that.
Myrn found she had arrived, as Aeasha had implied, well in advance of the other guests at the Sultan’s party. While she waited in a richly decorated anteroom, she spent the time examining the shelves of books and scrolls around the walls, trying to decipher their strange titles and wondering if any of them contained pictures. She reached for a large, leather-bound volume, intending to leaf through it.
“A most ponderous and learned treatise on civil engineering,” said a voice behind her.
Turning, Myrn smiled at a rather dour girl with heavy, reddish-brown hair and a bad case of acne on her chin.
She was dressed as frumpily as possible for one wearing the light, loose clothing of the women of Samarca. She was tall and gangly, perhaps thirteen years of age, with practically no figure at all. Her brown-yellow evening robe fell straight from her thin shoulders to the floor.
“I’m Myrn Brightglade,” the Journeyman said at once, smiling warmly and nodding her head. “I guess you’re the Vizier’s daughter, Lady Gerhana, aren’t you? Someone told me you also lived in the hareem,’’
“I am the Grand Vizier’s daughter,” declared the young lady, touching Myrn’s extended hand tentatively. “I am... pleased to meet you, a stranger from over Sea!”
“Grand, then,” said Myrn with a laugh. “I’ve met your father, of course. And heard a little about you, Gerhana, my dear. How old are you?”
Gerhana blushed bright red and admitted to being almost fourteen years of age.
“A difficult age for us girls,” Myrn sympathized. “I remember being thirteen. I wanted desperately to be a boy like my brothers. But I found later that being a girl had overwhelming compensations.”
“If you say so, Mistress Brightglade,” replied the Vizier’s—Grand Vizier’s—daughter with a sad little sigh.
“I say it, but you’ll have to experience it for yourself, Gerhana. Tell me about yourself! I haven’t seen many ... in fact, I’ve seen no young people your age here since I arrived.”
“Oh, there’re plenty of them about the palace and out in the city,” offered Gerhana, showing a glint of enthusiasm for the first time. “Unfortunately, my father—”
She closed her mouth with a snap as several men appeared in the doorway, talking animatedly and laughing. Among them was Captain Mallet, who broke away from his new friends and came to greet Myrn with some relief.
“My brand-new friend, Lady Gerhana, the Grand Vizier’s daughter,” Myrn introduced them. “Captain Mallet is commander of the sloop Encounter” she explained to Gerhana. “A good friend and trusted guardian, I can attest.”
“You are not his concubine, then?” Gerhana asked with disturbing directness.
“Not... what... ?” began Mallet, surprised by the blunt question from one so young.
“No, Captain Mallet was kind enough to allow me to travel with him to this place,” Myrn said. “I’ll explain it to you later, if you’d like. Captain Mallet is a good friend of mine, and of my husband’s, also.”
Gerhana frowned for a moment, then said, “That explains why you are housed in the seraglio, rather than sharing a bed with the good Captain.”
A splendidly dressed and beturbaned young man with a carefully curled and trimmed short beard and long mustaches waxed into magnificent curves on either side of his smiling mouth came in, greeting Gerhana with a cordial bow and clapping Mallet on the shoulder.
The Grand Vizier’s daughter bowed deeply and Myrn followed her lead.
“Is this your ward, then, Captain Mallet?”
“This is Mistress Myrn Manstar Brightglade, Sire,” Mallet introduced her. “From the island called Flowring in South Seas. Wife of a very good friend of mine, Fire Wizard Douglas Brightglade of Wizards’ High in Dukedom. Myrn, my dear, this is His Most Solemn Majesty, the Sultan Trobuk of this land Samarca. He’s our host and the sole ruler of this beautiful country.”
Myrn managed another graceful curtsy and a brilliant smile.
“I’ve had the pleasure of meeting your beautiful Sultana, sir,” she said. “We are already good friends, I think.”
“Ah, my Nioba! She should be here momentarily. It is protocol for the Sultana to arrive last, you understand.”
“That explains why Lady Aeasha made sure I arrived early,” said Myrn.
“I’m sure of it. Tell me, Mistress, have you been in our country long?”
“Only a very short while, sir,” admitted Myrn.
“And how do you find it?” the Sultan inquired.
“Delightful, Your Majesty.” Myrn answered. “Absolutely delightful!”
Just then the outer door w
as swung wide by a pair of young men in splendid green-and-white livery who bowed deeply to the assembled company and then, turning to flank the door, bowed even more deeply to the latest arrival, the Sultana Nioba.
“My dear!” cried Sultan Trobuk, glowing suddenly with obvious pride and affection. “Come and meet out new friends from the far West.”
“Sultan-husband!” murmured Nioba, bowing. “Yes, I’ve already met the delightful Lady Myrn, thank you. And this must be the Seacaptain of whom she told me... Mallet of Wayness?”
Mallet bowed extra deeply, a bit flustered by the appearance of the beautiful young Sultana.
A red-turbaned court functionary appeared at an inner door, announcing supper. Further conversation was lost in a general movement toward the dining room.
“You’ve met Gerhana, the daughter of our Grand Vizier?” Nioba asked Myrn once they were settled at their table.
“We’ve had but a few moments to chat, Your Highness,” replied Myrn, smiling at the girl warmly. “I look forward to talking to her much more.”
“We’re fellow inmates of the seraglio,” Gerhana said a bit sourly. “We’ll have plenty of time to get to know each other.”
The Sultan and the male members of the dinner party were seated at a large, well-laden table on the terrace looking out over the lake, where the sun was setting. Gerhana’s father arrived just then, bowing and scraping, ignoring the ladies except for a perfunctory nod in their direction.
The few other ladies present, wives of the Sultan’s ministers, were seated with the Sultana, Myrn, and Gerhana at a smaller table indoors.
Servants immediately entered through a hidden doorway, bearing pitchers of iced fruit nectar and, Myrn suspected, wines and aperitifs for the men to accompany the first course, a dark green ice decorated with delicate rosettes of mint and spearmint leaves.
The ladies’ table got only the fruit nectar to drink, which pleased Myrn well, for it was delicious.
“If you desire wine, Lady Myrn,” said Nioba, “I’ll ask the steward to serve it to you.”
“Women,” said Gerhana with a grimace, “are not supposed to be able to control themselves after a sip of anything with alcohol in it.”
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